


Break.

by Werepirechick



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TV 2012), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: Anger, Dysfunctional Family, Dysfunctional Relationships, Frustration, Gen, Guilt, Self-Destruction, Threats of Violence, Violent Thoughts, and i don't blame him, donnie's so tired, give the genius a rest, i feel so bad for him lately, let him feel okay at least for a little while
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-24
Updated: 2017-01-24
Packaged: 2018-09-19 15:41:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9448064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Werepirechick/pseuds/Werepirechick
Summary: Sometimes, Donnie doesn't want to build things.Sometimes, he wants to break things instead.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A vent fic on Donnie's behalf, and some venting on my part too.
> 
> Set somewhere after 'Four-fold trap'.

 

 

Donnie stared down at his desk, looking long and hard at the scrawled notes scattered over it.

Months’ worth of work, compiled theories, and tens of formulas. Weeks and weeks of sleepless days and nights trying and failing to figure out an impossible seeming task.

Donnie had laid it all out, his painstaking work, to examine it a thousandth time for a solution.

Right then though, all he could see in his own writing was failure and frustration.

_(“Well, then try harder!”)_

Donnie’s concentration twitched, suppressed anger reacting to those words. His brother’s voice echoed in his head still, repeating that sentence over and over.

_(“- then try harder!”)_

Donnie’s hands clenched themselves, and he leaned hard on his elbows.

Deep breath in, deep breath out.

Donnie stared at his notes, trying again to find anything he could have missed.

Re-reading his own work, a countless time around, it made his mouth taste like copper. Filling his mouth and making it impossible to taste anything else.

It was just more of him. More of his failings. More of his tight, snarling frustrations.

Donnie’s emotions turned bitter, Leo’s words again running through his mind.

_(“-try harder!”)_

What had he been doing? What exactly had he been doing, for months now, other than _trying?_

Again and again and _again-_ Donnie didn’t do anything _but_ try.

He hadn’t been succeeding. Leo was still pushing him. _Everyone_ was still pushing him.

Pushing and pushing and _pushing-_

_(“-try harder!”)_

Donnie sucked in a long, harsh breath. His throat felt tight, like something had a vice grip around it and was slowly, and painfully, tightening its grip. Choking him, strangling him, pulling him down, down, down-

Donnie closed his eyes.

Deep breath in.

Deep breath out.

_(“-try HARDER!”)_

Deep breath in.

Deep breath-

_(“-TRY HARDER!”)_

-out.

Deep breath in-

_(“- **TRY HARDER!** ”)_

Donnie opened his eyes, glaring at his work.

He closed them again.

He took a deep breath. Then breathed out again.

He imagined, opening his eyes, and throwing all his notes to the ground. Sweeping his arm across the table, and scattering the papers so they crumpled on the stone floor.

He imagined, grabbing his carefully hoarded glass beakers, and smashing them against the walls. Thrown one after another with all his strength, until there weren’t any of them left. Glass littering the cement, broken beyond repair.

Donnie saw himself turning on his carefully salvaged machines, tearing them apart one by one. He saw himself pick up his bo staff, and destroy each of his cherished mechanical tools. Slamming the blunt, bone-breaking ends of his staff against them- until there was nothing but pieces and dents.

He saw himself finally- _finally-_ start screaming.

Screaming- _howling-_ as he took apart his favorite space. His favorite space that had become cramped, filled with failed inventions and failed experiments and _failure-_

He saw his staff break, splintering finally under the weight of his anger. Shards and halves of it falling onto the ground, broken by the sheer destruction Donnie was wreaking.

Without it in his grasp, he turned to taking things apart with his hands.

Throwing tables, chairs, carts- tossing them aside so they clattered and broke. No care where they landed, no room to comprehend the ache building in his fingers.

Glass and metal and wood- shattering, warping, breaking in his hands. Gone, it had to be gone, all of it gone and out of his sight, where he wouldn’t have to stare at it anymore-

Break another thing, break all of it, destroy it and the feeling of failure, destroy everything so none of it would exist to _torment him_ _anymore-_

Donnie opened his eyes.

His notes were still there. He hadn’t moved them, or his trembling arms.

Donnie sighed, and released the tension in his limbs.

He sat back, away from the glaring problems on his desk. The air of his lab was stagnant, only soft beeps from active machines along the walls. His beakers and delicate glass tubes were still intact, and his mechanical creations still puttered on.

His notes still lay in front of him. Mocking him.

Donnie’s anger drained away, and he felt achingly tired.

The tightness around his throat was still there. Still choking him slowly.

He’d used to feel completely at ease in his lab, no matter what problem he was working on. He used to be able to enter it, and leave everything behind.

Now though, with half-finished vital weapons projects littering the tables, the retro-mutagen samples and experiments bubbling away in their corner, and his t-phone constantly on and at his side in case of a call to battle-

-the problems from outside his safe space had followed him in, and made themselves at home.

His lab used to feel like a sanctuary. Filled only with what he wanted it to be, where he could build and make and just _be._

Now, it felt more like a prison. An endless list of things to do, an ever increasing pile of issues and dangers to address.

He used to feel free in his lab. Now he felt caged.

Donnie felt tired. So, so tired.

He sighed, closed his eyes, and wistfully thought of burning it all away. Of letting his anger take hold, and destroy everything around him.

He didn't do that. He didn't move at all for a solid minute.

Then, he opened his stinging eyes, and got back to work.

Prison or not. Cage or not. It didn’t matter.

He had work to do, for the benefit of his family.

_(“Well, then try harder!”)_

He’d try harder. He’d keep trying harder until he solved things.

That’s just what he did. That’s just who he was. That's just what he had to do.

Donnie gently moved his papers around, and tried looking at things from a different angle. Maybe… maybe this time… he’d figure it out…

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> We all hit a point like this. A point where making something just doesn't make sense, and you just want to tear it all apart so you won't have to look at it anymore.
> 
> Been there, done that.
> 
> I feel like Donnie's been at this point before, but never gotten to go through with it. No one let's him vent his frustrations, and I personally think that'll eventually come back to bite everyone. Self-destruction is never pretty.
> 
> Canon needs to ease off this kid. I can only imagine how stressful things have gotten for him, especially lately.


End file.
